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Adblock Plus said it has reached 200 million downloads. The ad-blocking application's co-founder Till Faida says the company's purpose is "misunderstood" by advertisers. "Adblock Plus doesn't judge what is a good ad and what is a bad one, and we don't automatically block ads either. Rather, we are an open-source community that decides in a public forum the merits of each ad, and our software empowers individual users to control their browsing experience and the amount and type of ads they are willing to accept," he says.

Nearly 30% of Internet browsers in the U.S. use some kind of ad-blocking software, and among millennials that number surpasses 40%, according to a recent survey. Later this summer, the IAB will be discussing ad-blocking guidelines and best practices with publishers.

Developers may soon be able to include ad-blocking extensions that also filter out cookies, pop-ups, images and other Web content in the Safari mobile browser. Ad-blocking is becoming more common across the Web. The feature is expected to create problems for advertisers and publishers that rely on ad revenue from mobile.

AdBlock Plus is offering an application for Android devices that can block all ads or allow only those ads that are deemed safe to appear. The PC version of the application has been downloaded 50 million times, and the company says the service can enhance ad effectiveness by eliminating the most irritating content. "It doesn't do good to force bad advertising on people. Our Acceptable Ads Initiative should give advertisers an incentive to focus on a better UI for customers," said Till Faida, co-founder of parent company Eyeo.

Software to block Web ads including pop-ups, display ads and embedded video is readily available, but so far it has not been widely adopted by users. IAB's VP for public policy, Mike Zaneis, said, "we are nowhere near that doomsday scenario," in which ad-blocking makes it impossible for publishers to monetize their sites. For instance, the popular political blog Daily Kos uses technology to identify users with ad-blocking software and requests that they allow ads to appear or else pay a fee for the content.